The Dance
by journie19
Summary: Gamora can't sleep...again. Stupid Peter, with his stupid "unspoken thing." Oneshot for all of you who need something to satisfy the Peter-and-Gamora sized hole in your chest after Vol. 2.


_AN: I couldn't help myself._

She had no clue what she was doing up again, sleepily stumbling down the metal corridor of Yondu's old ship, making for the central catwalk that had proved to be Gamora's thinking spot every single night over the past three weeks, since the Ego fiasco.

This was stupid, and Gamora knew it. "Some unspoken thing." Peter was a fool, rambling on about this "unspoken thing" between the two of them. Comparing them to Sam and Diana from _Cheers_ , whatever that was.

She leaned over the metal railing on the catwalk, staring at the different levels of the ship below her. This thing must be ancient, an old freighter used to cart goods through the quadrant. Yondu must've gone all over the place in this thing with his ravagers…and Peter. Gamora tried to picture it, a young Peter Quill, running through the ship with his blasters and old Walkman, thinking he was going to be eaten by a member of the crew. As much as she may have tried to fight it, Gamora felt herself smile.

Peter had told her stories of growing up as a ravager, during late nights when neither of them could sleep. Nobody else knew those stories; they were told to Gamora, and Gamora alone. Gamora wasn't quite sure how to handle that information, didn't quite know what it meant. All she knew is that she trusted Peter with her life, and she couldn't stop damn thinking about him, and it was driving her nuts.

He was a cocky, ignorant fool. He was selfish. He was gross. He flirted with any girl under the sun. He never took anything seriously.

Gamora sighed and slid to the floor. It was rickety, metal, and generally uncomfortable. Peter was infuriating, that's what he was. A stupid, foolish, hot, caring, good, _stupid_ guy. And there was stupid something between them, and it was stupid seen by everyone, and Peter kept stupid bringing it up, and Gamora didn't stupid know what to do about it.

Gamora heard music playing softly, from the other end of the catwalk.

"Oh no," she muttered, briefly considering jumping over the railing. The next landing was only two floors below her; she'd made worse jumps than that before.

But before she could slip over the rail, she heard Peter whisper her name.

"Gamora?" his voice echoed across the catwalk, over the sound of the music playing quietly from that glass square that Kraglin had given Peter after Ego smashed the old Walkman. The glass square was playing the first song Gamora had ever heard, the first song that Peter had ever tried to get her to dance with him to—something about being a fool, and falling in love. Gamora almost laughed. It was ironic, really, that song.

She didn't move as Peter made his way down the catwalk to her; she sat still as a stone, meeting Peter's eyes in an unblinking stare. His eyes were the same, soft green they always were, his hair a swooping mess of glinting blond curls. He had dark circles under his eyes and wasn't walking with the same swagger as usual. He was exhausted. Gamora deduced that he'd gotten just about as much sleep as she had gotten over the past few weeks, which is to say, almost none.

He sat beside her on the rickety metal catwalk and made to stop the music, but Gamora caught his hand before he could.

"Leave it," she said quietly, not letting go of his hand. He nodded once, and flipped his hand over to intertwine his fingers with hers.

"Couldn't sleep?" he asked, stroking her hand with his thumb. Gamora closed her eyes at the sensation of it, ignoring the loud, insistent voice inside her head that screamed at her to RUN.

She shook her head in response. "I remember this melody."

Peter grinned and looked at the musical glass square. "This thing has 300 songs on it, and I'm listening to the same one I've always listened to."

Gamora shrugged. "It has value to you. You have memories with it, with your mother."

Peter nodded. He scooted closer to her, brushing a bit of hair out of her face. Gamora froze. Her heart was beating fast, _too_ fast. "Don't forget the memories with you, on Knowhere."

Gamora shivered, thinking of how Peter had held her, dancing slowly to that song. She didn't even know that she _could_ shiver, didn't know what natural functions her body still had after Thanos screwed her DNA up again and again and again. She thought of Nebula, whose voice was more machine than human. What if Gamora was like that, more machine, less natural? Peter was human, he was warm, had a heart. She was cold, scared, and harsh. The song ended but Peter pressed a button on the glass square to make the song start again.

"Dance with me," he whispered, pulling her up. The catwalk creaked in protest, echoing all across the ship.

"Peter…" Gamora began, wishing she had jumped off the catwalk when she had had the chance.

"Nope," he said, wrapping an arm around her, "you're not getting out of this one."

Gamora sighed and took his hand, keeping herself a respectable distance from him. She loved dancing, and she hated loving it. She hated the fact that her heart was beating fast again, and that she was breathing harder than normal. She could run for miles, could lift Drax with one hand, but dancing with Peter made her lose her breath. He tightened the arm that rested on her lower back, which effectively pushed Gamora closer to him. They were practically flush with each other; if she wanted to, she could rest her head on his chest.

Instead, she looked up at him. He had a small smile on his face as he stared back down at her. He was humming along with the music, a quiet, insistent sound that she felt rumbling in his chest. "We're good together, you know," he said, tightening his arm again. Gamora was pressed tightly against him, and every fiber of her body wanted to run. Yet, she didn't, because damn, it felt _good_ to be held like this, to be held by Peter Quill, the man that she couldn't get out of her head, the man that she had this _thing_ with.

Gamora took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and rested her head against Peter's chest. She forced the fear out of her body, out of her mind, and swayed back and forth to the slow melody of the song with Peter's arms wrapped tightly around her. She could feel his heart beating against her cheek. It was steady, a never-ending thumping that kept him alive. Gamora thought that perhaps Peter's heart was beating as fast as her own; perhaps he felt just as nervous and shaky as she did.

"Peter?" Gamora asked, pleased that her voice didn't quake.

"Mmm?" he said, pressing his lips to the top of her head. Gamora sighed pleasantly, ignoring her "get out of here" instincts.

"What are we going to do about this?" she glanced up at him again, and felt her hand moving of its own accord to cup his face. Peter closed his eyes and leaned into her touch. Gamora felt her heart skip a beat—this was entirely un-regular.

"We're going to stop worrying about it," he said, leaning down to touch his forehead to hers. "We have a thing, and that's all."

"That's all?" she asked, examining every tiny detail about his face. Despite the obvious exhaustion that hung around him, he had a healthy glow about his face. He needed to shave; his facial hair had grown beyond its usual stubble and was coming in thicker than Gamora had ever seen it. A brief thought flashed across her mind, a thought that Gamora had been fighting for months, since the first time she and Peter had danced on Knowhere.

What would Peter's stubble feel like against her face, when he was kissing her? What would it feel like in other places…between her thighs, for example?

Gamora mentally thanked Thanos for apparently taking away her ability to blush.

"What?" Peter said, his eyes studying her face. Damn him for being so perceptive.

"Nothing," Gamora said shortly, trying to force away the image of Peter's face buried between her legs. She squirmed in his arms, trying to quell the stubborn heat that was flooding her body.

Peter raised an eyebrow. "If you say so." A new song started playing from the musical square; the one that they had danced to on Ego's planet. Gamora frowned, thinking of their argument.

Why was she so afraid of this? Of Peter? He was just a _guy_ , after all. She'd been through so much, survived being torn apart and put back together again, surviving losing both parents and everything she cared about.

"Come on, I know you're thinking something," Peter said, tilting her chin up with an insistent thumb. Gamora met his eyes and tried to communicate nonverbally her fear. Peter nodded, apparently understanding. "I know."

They swayed back and forth, and the catwalk made all sorts of noises that Gamora hoped nobody else could hear. They went through all of Peter's slow songs, from both the tapes that his mother had left him, until they landed on the first one again.

"I fooled around and fell in…" Peter said quietly, inhaling deeply instead of completing the sentence. Gamora felt his grip around her tighten; she let herself be pulled to him, let herself stand on her tiptoes, leveling her face with his. "Ah, screw it," he said, bending his head to hers.

 _Don't run don't run don't run don't run don't run don't run don't run_.

The thought repeated itself in Gamora's mind at first, when Peter touched his lips to hers. And then the fear was suddenly gone, shoved out the window with everything else that made Gamora a stiff, harsh weapon and was replaced with a burning, unstoppable desire to get _closer_ to Peter.

Gamora heard a deep sound emit from Peter's throat as he pushed her to the wall at the end of the catwalk, one hand resting against the wall and the other clasped tightly with hers. She had been right—the sensation of Peter's facial hair scraping against her face was every bit as pleasant and rough as she had imagined it. He traced her lips with his tongue, and Gamora let him in with a sound she didn't know she could make—a breathless sigh that made Peter smile proudly against her mouth.

"Shut up," she muttered, resting her head against the wall as Peter kissed his way down her neck, latching his lips onto a particularly sensitive spot near her collarbone. Gamora fought back a groan.

"No," muttered Peter. "Don't do that." He continued to nip at suck at her skin, turning it a deep, dark green.

"Don't do what?" Gamora said breathlessly.

"Hold back," he muttered.

Gamora thought for a second before ripping off the old, ratty shirt she'd found on Peter's ship six months ago and throwing it to the ground. She stared at him defiantly, bare-chested, her breasts heaving. Peter met her gaze evenly, his eyes a dark shade of green she'd never seen before.

"I thought you weren't falling for my…what did you call it? "Pelvic sorcery?" he asked, trying to keep a grin off of his face.

"Shut _up_ , Gamora said.

 _AN: Aaaaaaand the end. Not going any further—just a happy lil story._


End file.
